Clarendon's House-warming.

When Clarendon had discerned beforehand
(As the cause can easily foretell the effect)
At once three deluges threatening our land,
'Twas the season, he thought, to turn architect.

Us Mars, and Apollo, and Vulcan consume;
While he, the betrayer of England and Flanders,
Like the kingfisher chooseth to build in the broom,
And nestles in flames like the salamanders.

But observing that mortals run often behind
(So unreasonable are the rates that they buy at),
His omnipotence therefore much rather designed,
How he might create a house with a fiat.

He had read of Rhodope, a lady of Thrace,
Who was digged up so often ere she did marry;
And wished that his daughter had had as much grace,
To erect him a pyramid out of her quarry.

But then recollecting how the harper Amphion
Made Thebes dance aloft while he fiddled and sung,
He thought, as an instrument he was most free on,
To build with the Jew's- trump of his own tongue.

Yet a precedent fitter in Virgil he found,
Of African Poultney, and Tyrian Dide;
That he begged for a palace so much of his ground,
As might carry the measure and name of a Hyde.

Thus daily his gouty inventions him pained,
And all for to save the expenses of brickbat;
That engine so fatal which Denham had brained,
And too much resembled his wife's chocolate.

But while these devices he all doth compare,
None solid enough seemed for his strong castor;
He himself would not dwell in a castle of air,
Though he had built full many a one for his master.

Already he had got all our money and cattle,
To buy us for slaves, and purchase our lands;
What Joseph by famine, he wrought by sea battle;
Nay, scarce the priest's portion could 'scape from his hands.

And hence like Pharaoh that Israel pressed
To make mortar and brick, yet allowed 'em no straw,
He cared not though Egypt's ten plagues us distressed,
So he could to build but make policy law.

The Scotch forts and Dunkirk, but that they were sold,
He would have demolished to raise up his walls;
Nay, e'en from Tangier have sent back for the mould,
But that he had nearer the stones of St. Paul's.

His woods would come in at the easier rate,
So long as the yards had a deal or a spar:
His friend in the navy would not be ingrate,
To grudge him some timber, who framed him the war.

To proceed in the model, he called in his Aliens,
The two Aliens, when jovial, who ply him with gallons;
The two Aliens who served his blind justice for balance,
The two Aliens who served his injustice for talons.

They approve it thus far, and said it was fine;
Yet his lordship to finish it would be unable,
Unless all abroad he divulged the design,
For his house then would grow like a vegetable.

His rent would no more in arrear run to Wor'ster;
He should dwell more noble and cheap too at home,
While into a fabric the presents would muster;
As by hook and by crook the world clustered of atom.

He liked the advice and then soon it assayed,
And presents crowd headlong to give good example,
So the bribes overlaid her that Rome once betrayed;
The tribes ne'er contributed so to the Temple.

Straight judges, priests, bishops, true sons of the seal,
Sinners, governors, farmers, bankers, patentees,
Bring in the whole mite of a year at a meal,
As the Cheddar club's dairy to the incorporate cheese.

Bulteale's, Beaken's, Morley's, Wren's fingers with telling
Were shrivelled, and Clutterbuck's, Eager's, and Kipps';
Since the act of oblivion was never such selling,
As at this benevolence out of the snips.

'Twas then that the chimney-contractors he smoked,
Nor would take his beloved canary in kind:
But he swore that the patent should ne'er be revoked,
No, would the whole parliament kiss him behind.

Like Jove under Ætna o'erwhelming the giant,
For foundation the Bristol sunk in the earth's bowel;
And St. John must now for the leads be compliant,
Or his right hand shall be cut off with a trowel.

For surveying the building, 'twas Prat did the feat;
But for the expense he relied on Worstenholme,
Who sat heretofore at the King's receipt,
But received now and paid the Chancellor's custom.

By subsidies thus both cleric and laic,
And with matter profane cemented with holy;
He finished at last his palace mosaic,
By a model more excellent than Lesly's folly.

And upon the terrace to consummate all,
A lantern like Faux's surveys the burnt town,
And shows on the top by the regal gilt ball,
Where you are to expect the sceptre and crown.

Fond city, its rubbish and ruins that builds,
Like vain chemists, a flower from its ashes returning,
Your metropolis house is in St. James's fields,
And till there you remove, you shall never leave burning.

This temple of war and of peace is the shrine,
Where this idol of state sits adored and accursed;
To handsel his altar and nostrils divine,
Great Buckingham's sacrifice must -be the first.

Now some (as all builders must censure abide)
Throw dust in its front and blame situation:
And others as much reprehend his back-side,
As too narrow by far for his expatiation;

But do not consider how in process of times,
That for namesake he may with Hyde Park it enlarge,
And with that convenience he soon, for his crimes,
At Tyburn may land and spare the Tower barge.

Or rather how wisely his stall was built near,
Lest with driving too far his tallow impair;
When, like the good ox, for public good cheer,
He comes to be roasted next St. James's fair.